NEW PROBE OVER CANCER TESTS
After breast screening blunder, fears over more NHS health checks
A PROBE has been launched amid fears thou- sands more Scots may have been caught up in an NHS screening shambles.
The Scottish Government investigation was sparked after it was revealed 1,700 women were denied life-saving breast cancer checks because of a ‘potentially devastating’ error in the screening system. Now NHS chiefs have ordered checks on whether people have missed appointments for bowel and cervical cancers, baby health checks and eye examinations for diabetics.
The revelations come after it emerged last week that more than 1,700 Scots women were denied vital NHS breast cancer checks because they were not sent invitations to screening appointments after an apparent glitch in the IT system.
Last night, a Scottish Government spokesman said: ‘We are looking closely across all national screening programmes to ensure that screening
invitation protocols are robust.’ Health Secretary Jeane Freeman apologised last week for the breast cancer blunder, but there were calls last night for her to answer questions at Holyrood on the new revelations.
Labour health spokesman Anas Sarwar said: ‘The news that more than 1,700 women were not invited to their crucial final breast screening appointment is deeply worrying and members of the public will rightly question if similar problems exist in other screening programmes for things such as bowel cancer.
‘The Health Secretary must keep parliament informed of any developments of the review into other screening programmes and must also quickly identify if any of the women who were not invited to their final screening appointment were subsequently diagnosed with breast cancer.’
Tory health spokesman Annie Wells said: ‘It is absolutely right that the Government investigates and confirms that no other IT errors have been made in any screening programmes. People’s lives are at risk, and the Scottish Government has a responsibility to ensure that these programmes are totally comprehensive.
‘It is also crucial that public trust is maintained in these programmes. The Government must do everything possible to reassure the public that no one else has been missed.’
Janice Preston of cancer charity Macmillan said: ‘It is right that the Scottish Government has initiated an indepth look at all screening processes. It is vital that all processes for all cancer types are in full working order.’
Ministers also came under fire for refusing to say how many of the women affected by the breast screening glitch had gone on to be diagnosed with the disease or died.
Last week, it was revealed that 1,761 women are being offered urgent mammograms because they were not sent invitations for assessments.
In some cases, the vital tests were last carried out six years ago. A similar error in England is thought to have led to the deaths of hundreds of women.
It is feared an undisclosed number of women in Scotland may have died.
The Scottish Government said: ‘Since discovering the issue affecting invitations for breast screening, our priority has been to identify and contact the women who were not invited to a final screen.
‘We will review the data that is available to establish whether there has been any change in the pattern of mortality among women who have not attended screening.’
An automated system identifies women when they reach their 70th birthday, but delays in breast cancer screening meant many had turned 71 before it reached them – and they were not sent a letter as the computer deemed them too old.
The IT glitch had been undiscovered for three years, meaning women last screened up to six years ago did not receive their final check.
Officials have identified all the women still living who had missed a screening appointment and letters have been sent out to them.
The new review will also look at screening for potentially fatal abdominal aortic aneurysms.
The Scottish Government added: ‘We have not been made aware of any additional issues with our screening programmes.’
The review of breast screening in Scotland was carried out after the ‘significant incident’ in England meant around 450,000 women were not invited to their final screenings between 2009 and this year.
That scandal is estimated to have shortened the lives of 270 women, sparking fears for the Scots who have gone unchecked.
People’s lives are at risk
WHEN it comes to cancer, early detection can be a matter of life and death.
Left unchecked, the disease can swiftly develop from being treatable to being incurable. For good reason, public health campaigns encourage regular check-ups and personal examination.
And so it is deeply troubling that hundreds of Scottish women were denied breast cancer checks because they were not invited to undergo screening.
Last week, it emerged that more than 1,700 women have been offered urgent mammograms because of this catastrophic breakdown in NHS systems. Now the Scottish Government has launched an investigation to find out if more Scots have been put at risk by similar failings in screening programmes for other illnesses such as cervical and bowel cancer.
We sincerely hope that further failures to invite people for screening are not discovered by this investigation. If the problem in breast cancer screening is found to exist in other areas, faith in the NHS will be further undermined. Cancer is a devastating illness and, although huge progress has been made in finding effective treatments, it can cut lives cruelly short.
How terrible it would be if some of these premature deaths had been preventable if only timely screening had been offered.
Those affected by cancer deserve the very best the NHS can offer. In the case of 1,761 women – and perhaps many more Scots – this fundamental requirement was not met.